Miller Reunion

Just this weekend, we attended a big family reunion. It's the first one in my memory. The last one was when I was around 1-3 years old (I can't remember exactly). These were the descendants of my great-grandparents, Leroy and Kate Miller. Grandpa Leroy passed away when I was about 12-years-old, but Grandma Kate just passed away in December of 2007. She was waiting to go pretty much since the time of her husband's passing. I don't mean "waiting" in the sense of not doing anything, but she did wonder why she was still here after Grandpa Leroy died. These were two really good people, and--if I do say so myself--they produced some fantastic descendants. It was fun to see these family members again (as I had met most of them at some point) and to catch up on their lives.

My Grandma Billie planned the weekend and it went great. We had all sorts of fun activities to help people play together and get acquainted. There was also enough down time to rest and relax.

One of the activities Grandma arranged for was a scavenger hunt. Susan (the woman to my right in the picture and one of my mom's cousins) commented that it wasn't exactly a fair arrangement since she had four kids and a pregnant woman in her group. That being the case, I think we were a fun group even if we didn't win. Albeit the kids were saying, "We'll just leave the adults to do this. We're just kids" sometime after the second clue. This coming from an eight-year-old (one of the oldest in the group), I said pishposh and made them stay until we all thought we were done.

My oldest brother doesn't care for the high altitude near Flagstaff and didn't think he would make it, but his daughter was sad about that, so he made arrangements to come at the last minute after all. This is a picture of them together.



This is my dad. There are real-life cowboys in our family, but my dad doesn't qualify. That's why I thought it was funny that he's wearing a sort of cowboy hat. I didn't even notice it at the family reunion, probably because he was out-shone by Matt, who had an authentic cowboy hat and looked the part a bit more. Of course, we made two movies and I was in the western, but I didn't have any right to that either. My dad looks more the part than I did wearing Patrick's basketball shorts and my baggy T-shirt.

My mom brought her parrots. One is an African Grey (named Isaac) and one is a Cockatoo (named Asimov). Asimov was in heaven with all the attention. He just stood there, grinding his beak and fluffing out his feathers. My mom's cousin Erin is in the picture below. She is an animal person like my mom and got along famously with Asimov (who Patrick doesn't care for very much at all, but he doesn't claim to be an animal person in the first place). Also below are Jamie, Erin's daughter, and her fiance.

This is my sweet niece. I got to spend almost the entire weekend with her. Well, she stayed in my parents' cabin, but we played during the day. This is soon before she left to go home with her mom.

Patrick's favorite day was the last, Sunday. By then, people had loosened up so everyone had become familiar with each other , and those who were already comfortable with each other had visited out all the missing years. The first group included the teenagers and kids and the second group included the adults; that meant that everyone was in the mood to play, which Patrick enjoys much more than visiting. Plus, it rained off and on all day so it was much cooler than it had been. Below, Patrick is playing dominoes with my cousins Dana and Toby, while my niece and her mom are looking on. All three of the players talk a lot of smack so it was entertaining to watch/listen to.

This is my dad acting like a scarry gorilla, chasing after one of the kids. (She's on the side of the picture running away while looking back at him.) The best part of this exchange was when my dad paused in the middle of the chase to pet Dana's dog, T-Bone. If the girl had seen him do it, she probably wouldn't have been so scared. Patrick and I were amused watching from afar, I guess because he plays the part so well it was funny to see it switch off briefly and for such a trivial but nice reason.

Another fun event was "the hayride." We weren't sure we'd participate in that one. For one thing, I am not big into bumpy rides these days, and for another Patrick's allergies probably would have gone crazy from the hay. However, there wasn't actually any hay on the ride, and I decided I'd hate to miss out (especially since Patrick wanted to go and thought I ought to come), so we went. It wasn't really too bumpy most of the time and it was fun visiting time while we rode around. We went on the second ride with the my parents' and grandparents' generation. This first ride was my generation and the one below me.

Below is a picture of me and Patrick (framed by a hula hoop (don't know why)). I think this is a funny pregnancy picture because my stomach looks so bubbled up.

I had to put in a nicer picture of us where we don't look so lazy and exhausted and (in my case) big. Plus, one of the nicest things about the vacation was all the time we got to spend together. With Patrick doing work and school right now, there are times that we don't seem to spend a lot of time together, so this was a nice break from the everyday busy-ness of life.